Eureka, “I found it!”

Have you ever lost something—like a ring, a phone or a watch?  Depending on its value, you did what it took to find it like the man who lost his wallet at a  party. So, he stood on a chair and shouted, “Excuse me ladies and gentlemen, I’ve just lost my wallet with over $500 in cash in it. To the person that finds it, I will give $50.”  Then, a voice emerged from the back, “I will give $75.”

We don’t know if the wallet owner countered with a bigger reward, but what we do know is there is other currency other than money that can be attached to the value of a lost item— Joy can lift you above and despite disappointments of the (l-o-s-t) that results in (l-o-s-s) of possession. That is why joy is one of the nine qualities of the Fruit of the Spirit that includes love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control listed in Galatians 5:23-24.

Life will deliver you an inordinate share of loss, creating some dark times like the parents of a newborn born without the ability to hear. But watch what happens with the miracle of a hearing aid: https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTBL1Ha5k/

God’s value of joy is a direct reflection of how He feels about the loss of any of His most valued creation—his children and Church —His sheep. He hears their cries as sheep who have lost their way because they have lost the capacity to hear their shepherd’s voice.  Christ is moved with compassion according to Matthew 9:36. This compassion—splanchnízomai in Greek—literally means “to be moved” as bowels move (inner vital organs) with an action necessary to function. In this case, His heart is moved with sympathy, to do something about our visible need—to restore lost joy.

This loss is visible in the present-day Church who has lost the capacity to hear each other’s cries. It has gone deaf to the cries of redrawn maps, gas pump stress, and hate-filled threats. Joy is M.I.A.

But there is hope for joy, once loss, to be rediscovered again like that of the sheep, coin and son in the Parable of the Lost Son in Luke 15:6-23.  This joy is an “over-joy” because it can be experienced over and above our frustrations, over and above our frantic-ness, and even over the apparent finalities of life. This over-joy is part of the Fruit of the Spirit of Galatian 5:22-23. This joy is not to be confused with happiness. Happiness is circumstantial. Happiness happens because of what is happening around you. But Holy Spirit derived joy is different, greater, over and above. It allows the Church to hear each other again and laugh.

Joy does a body good because joy is possible even in our frustrations.  It was for the frustrated shepherd in the part one of the “parables of the lost”—the lost sheep. We see his over-joy amid frustration in verses 4-6 with the key joy verse: 6

 6 and he goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’

The frustrated shepherd found joy when he found that one lost sheep. Jesus tells this parable because the Pharisees— (and most of today’s church)—are upset that He is hanging out with the lost. So, He tells them of a shepherd who forsook ninety-nine other sheep to go after one lost sheep.

The shepherd’s frustration stems from the nature of sheep. Ninety-nine managed to stay in the safety of an open field, but there is always one that can try your last “black nerve”. Sheep aren’t the brightest bulb in the chandelier.  They don’t have balance. They can’t right themselves up if they fall on their backs. They’ll just lie there and kick until the hot sun takes them out. They also have poor depth perception. They don’t see distances well and will walk right off a cliff. They also blindly follow their leader. If the leader is lost, they are lost. That’s enough to make anybody frustrated.

Know any sheep like that—young and old? (Or maybe that’s you?) They can’t stand on their own two feet when the least bit of trouble knocks them down. They can’t see obvious trouble ahead, and they follow the wrong people. That’s frustrating to a shepherd, a pastor or a parent.  But what do you do? Make lamb chops? If you slaughtered one every time one gets lost, you won’t have much of a herd left.

What is a frustrated shepherd to do? You go and get that one sheep of the group. It’s bad business, but good Gospel. That’s love. And when you have that unconditional love, joy will soon result when you go after the loss. The shepherd was so overjoyed, he threw a party. Recovery of the lost is a community celebration.

Church, we should go after that “one” lost and celebrate its recovery as well because you are that “one”. Isaiah 53:16 reminds us, “We all “are like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”

 In this parable, we are the sheep. God is the Shepherd. As frustrating as we are to Him, constantly losing our balance, repeatedly walking off cliffs, and following the wrong doctrine and deity, Christ goes after us, hoists us on His shoulders, and joyously brings us back into the fold. That is unconditional love and overjoy.

So Church, continue to support ministry whose focus is the frustrating sheep: the troublemaker, rejecter, jail frequent flyer, the “too far gone”. But by the grace of God go you.  Get the Fruit of joy; it does the Body of Christ good. Throw a party. Can you say, “Party over here.”

Joy also does a body good because overjoy is possible even when we are frantic. Like the woman who lost a coin, she found her joy and her money in part 2 of the “parables of the lost”. We see her in verses 8-10 with the key joy verse 9:

                   9 "And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin which I had lost!' And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin. 

The woman was frantic, urgent—if you will—because she lost one coin even though she had ten. She expended an inordinate energy sweeping and incurred the costs of lamp oil searching for the one coin. It didn’t make good economic sense unless all the denarii represented perhaps her life savings. She couldn’t afford to lose even one. The world saw it as a just one denary, equivalent to a day’s wage. But to her it meant more.

So, it is with God and people. He sees value in a person where the world sees just another person devalued and dismissed. God is the urgent woman. He knows their worth.  We see that valuation in verse 10:

10"In the same way, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents."

What God sees is a sinner saved, His highest creation, “made in His image” according to Genesis1:26, “fearfully and wonderfully made” according to Psalm 139, “bought with a price,” according to 1 Corinthians 6:20.  So he is happy—no, overjoyed—to find you, even when you’ve tried to hide in a whistly bottle, or conceal in a social close, mask in a  loveless marriage.

Coins, like people, have a value; we can’t afford to write them off like a bad debt.

• What if the world wrote off Maya Angelou because she was raped at 8-years-old? The world would have missed out on her literary works like I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, and her poetry like Phenomenal Woman.

• What if the world wrote off Ethel Waters because she was the product of a rape of her 13-year-old mother?  The world would have missed out on this great voice who gave us “His Eye is on the Sparrow”. 

• What if we wrote off Oprah Winfrey who was raped at age nine-years-old? We would have missed out on her contribution to the “Color Purple” and the Emmy winning Oprah Show and her millions of dollars of philanthropy.

This is not an issue of “Pro-Life” or “Pro-Choice”. This is an issue of “Pro-Joy”. Let the Holy Spirit be your guide.

Got loss?  No need to be frantic. Get joy because you are valued by God no matter how little you are valued by the world. Joy will do your Body of Christ good.

Finally, joy does a body good because overjoy is possible even when you are faced with finality. The final part of the “parables of the lost” is the parable of the prodigal son. It features a faithful father who thought he lost his boy but found a resurrection joy. We see that in verses 11-32. The key joy is verse 32:

                  32 But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost, now found.' "

You know the story: a wasteful son wants his inheritance; goes to the big city and blows it at the strip club; lands a job pumping sewage from septic tanks where he comes to himself and reflects, “These stinks. I’m going home.”

The real prodigal is not the son, but the father who is over the top in grace as he faced the finality of the death of a child. In that day, a disinherited son was considered a dead son.  But every day, the father waited with open arms by the side of the road looking for his son’s return. When he did, daddy is more than happy. He was overjoyed.

So is God. You are the sons, dead in your sins, disinherited by our disobedience. But God is always looking down the road of Calvary for your return, to hear you say, “I’m sorry daddy”. Like the faithful father who celebrated the resurrection of his son with a barbeque despite a second son’s “hate-in”, God’s got a second homecoming party planned for the return of Christ to retrieve his prodigal brothers and sister. Haters not allowed.

What the father felt and the God—the Father—feels is resurrection joy. Death—either the many figurative deaths on this side of life or the mortal death at our final breath—is a seemly and shadowy death. For those who have received and believe the Holy Spirit that death is dead—a scorpion without a sting according to 1 Corinthians15:55:  O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?  

So, losses that seem final are not fatal:

• Careers can be resurrected.

• Relationships can be raised.

• Churches can be revived.

Church, come to yourself like the wayward son sitting on a heap of garbage. Over-joy overcomes loss of membership, relationship and leadership. It ain’t over till God says it over. Do your part. Stand at the crossroad with receptive, forgiving arms, empty of questions, full of joy. You’ve got a party to give. Get the Fruit of Joy. It does the body good.

Joy, one of the nine qualities of the Fruit of the Spirit does the Body of Christ good. I call it “over-joy” because when life hands out frustration, franticness and finality, joy overcomes when loss tries to overwhelm. Like the frustrated shepherd, give up on no one. Like the frantic woman, sweep till you find the value the world cannot see. And be like the father, with open arms be prodigal in grace. 

When life hands you a loss, God gifts you with joy. God said it better: “Weeping may endure for a night. But joy comes in the morning.” Church, the morning you get your hearing back, when you hear your brother’s cries and are moved with compassion to do something meaningful about them, you will find you overjoy and laugh like a baby.

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A Forgiving Fire is a story that will give you joy. Get it today. aforgivingfire.com